State gives $1.6M for LI shellfish hatcheries

By: David Winzelberg June 20, 2018Comments Off on State gives $1.6M for LI shellfish hatcheries

Four Long Island towns will get a total of $1.6 million in state grants to expand and upgrade their public shellfish hatcheries.

Each of the four towns–Brookhaven, East Hampton, Islip and Hempstead–will get about $400,000 to help restore shellfish populations, part of the state Department of Environmental Conservation’s $10.4 million effort to improve water quality and bolster coastal communities on Long Island, according to a DEC statement.

Over the last 40 years, the clam population in the Great South Bay has declined significantly from overharvesting in the 1970s and early 1980s. Efforts to restore the shellfishery have been unsuccessful due to poor survival of juvenile clams and reproductive failures of adult clams as a result of harmful algal blooms known as brown tides.

Clam harvest in the Great South Bay has fallen by 93 percent over the past 25 years, according to the DEC, impairing the area’s ability to absorb excess nitrogen, thereby creating the conditions for more intense algae blooms.

As part of the restoration initiative, hard clam seed will be supplied to one of five sanctuary sites that will be established here this fall, including Bellport Bay, Shinnecock Bay, Huntington Harbor, Hempstead Bay and South Oyster Bay.

“The Public Hatchery Expansion Grants and New York’s Shellfish Restoration Council will help reestablish these areas as prime coastal habitat and support much-needed upgrades to our shellfish hatcheries,” DEC Commissioner Basil Seggos said in the statement.

The New York Shellfish Restoration Council is co-chaired by Stony Brook University, Cornell Cooperative Extension and the Billion Oyster Project to provide recommendations on coordination, management and monitoring of shellfish restoration efforts, identify future restoration initiatives, and coordinate training and education programs throughout the New York Marine and Coastal District.